Long Ball Bites Tong in 6-3 Loss to Reds

Jonah Tong‘s second career start in Cincinnati was much anticipated.

The righty impressed in his first start at Citi Field against the Marlins, allowing only one earned run in five promising innings.

However, on Saturday night against the Reds amidst a pennant race, Tong didn’t match the success of his first start.

Tong’s home run allowed in the second inning was a first for both himself and Sal Stewart. It was Tong’s first homer allowed in the majors, and also rookie Stewart’s first homer in the majors. It came via a high fastball, and was just out of the reach of Cedric Mullins.

The second came off the bat of Matt McLain, which was also barely out of the reach of Mullins’ glove. It was a solo shot in the third inning, getting a run back for the Reds after the Mets had scored in the top half of the inning.

And finally, the third homer was out of the reach of all players on the field. Austin Hays turned on an inside fastball, sending it 392 feet to left field to open the Reds’ lead to three runs.

The results were shocking based on Tong’s track record. The rookie had only allowed two homers this season in 113 2/3 innings in the minors this season, and only three homers in 113 innings in 2024. Overall, the native Canadian had only allowed 11 homers in 260 combined professional innings.

But Saturday was different. As Gary Cohen and Ron Darling mentioned on the broadcast, the Reds seemed to be sitting fastball. And they didn’t miss three of them.

Another glaring issue for the rookie on Saturday was walks. The rookie allowed four free passes, one which came before the homer to Stewart. Tong hadn’t allowed a walk in his first start to the Marlins, but did walk 3.7 batters per nine innings this season in the minors.

Outside the walks and homers, Tong’s stuff looked dominant. He struck out six batters and only allowed three hits. Those three hits just happened to be homers.

His fastball was sitting in the high 90s and he was locating them for strikes. And despite not locating his offspeed pitches consistently throughout the night, Tong generated 13 swings and misses.

Perhaps the biggest issue Tong faced tonight was run support. Something he got plenty of in his first start.

The Mets only mustered three runs against Brady Singer and the Reds’ bullpen Saturday night. And it wasn’t because they had opportunities.

New York went 2-for-9 with runners in scoring position and left 10 men on base. It was reminiscent of their struggles earlier in the season, and not in line with their .372 batting average with runners in scoring position from August.

Their biggest opportunity came in the third inning. The Mets loaded the bases via walks from Mullins and Francisco Lindor, and an infield single from Juan Soto. One base knock would have tied the game at 2-2.

Brandon Nimmo was able to bring home Mullins with a well-struck sacrifice fly-out, but ran into poor luck after. Pete Alonso — the Mets’ go-to guy in RBI spots — was struck by the first pitch of his at-bat, then Jeff McNeil rocked a ball 90.4 miles per hour for a ground out.

From the third on, the Mets failed to finish rallies against Reds’ pitching. Lindor doubled in the fifth with one out, but caught stealing third base, Brett Baty struck out with two runners on base in the sixth, and Francisco Alvarez struck out with two runners in scoring position in the eighth.

The Mets put together one more rally in the ninth, but were down 6-2 at that point. Lindor doubled again, reached third on a Soto single, then came across the plate via a wild pitch. But Emilio Pagan buckled down from there, striking out Nimmo and Alonso to end the game. The only other run the Mets scored came from a Jared Young solo homer.

And even despite the offense going 2-for-9 with runners in scoring position and Tong allowing four runs, the Reds truly didn’t put the game away until the seventh against Ryne Stanek.

The righty reliever came into the game in the seventh with the Mets trailing by only two runs. Stanek followed by allowing two singles, one walk, and one RBI single to TJ Friedl to extend the Reds’ lead to 5-2. He was replaced by Kevin Herget after recording only one out, who then walked Elly De La Cruz with the bases loaded to add another earned run to Stanek’s ledger.

With the loss, the Mets lost in both the National League East and NL wild card race. The Phillies beat the Marlins earlier in the day 4-2, opening their division lead back up to seven games, where it was before they were swept out of Citi Field. The Mets also fell back to the third wild card with the loss.

Player of the Game

Francisco Lindor was the player of the game Saturday. The shortstop went 3-for-4 with two doubles, including extending his on-base streak to nine consecutive plate appearances before grounding out in the seventh inning.

On Deck

The Mets will go for the series win Sunday at 1:40 PM. Brandon Sproat will take the mound for his MLB debut and be opposed by flamethrowing Hunter Greene. The game will be televised on WPIX 11 and broadcast on WHSQ 880 AM.

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